News

curly

October 2, 2017

National Work Life Week 2nd to 6th October 2017 is great news for life coaches and business coaches as we concentrate on achievement with work-life balance. The week is all about employers and employees focussing on well-being at work and work-life balance. Employers are being urged to provide activities for staff, and to showcase their flexible working policies and practices this week. Employers who promote well-being and work-life balance will be augmenting their recruitment drives and speed up employing healthy, happy staff.

You can tweet @workingfamuk and join the conversation using #WorkLifeWeek

The week start with a National Work Life Week Conference this is on the first day of the week on Monday 2nd October and comprises the 2017 Top Employers award. The conference says that it will contain best practice examples and tools to take back to your workplace, be the first to find out the results of the annual best practice benchmarking survey. They will be announcing the Top 30 Employers for Working Families. If you are interested in finding the best companies to work for, ones which value you and your contribution join the chat.

The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has been headlining the news. It was announced that it is being adopted by the UK ahead of Europe.
Since 16th February 2017, I have been posting some interesting and important details about the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) which is expected to come into force around the middle of 2018 because I wanted my coaches to be prepared well in advance.
In my blogs on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) I have looked at what was being proposed from a coach point of view. In the initial entry I explained the importance of coaches in knowing about the rules which will be coming in with the new General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) and although all of my coaches will have a full understanding of the need to register and abide by the current rules I am sadly aware that many life coaching and business coaching courses are lacking in detail and especially within the business set up area. This a a critical area for coaches and it is my belief that they should be fully aware of their legal responsibilities before they leave the workshop part of the course.
My General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) post on the 22nd February covers the information you, as a coach, hold on your clients and suppliers.
Following up on the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) the posting on the 3rd March deals with privacy notices which will need to be changed in time for the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) implementation.
On 4th April I covered the General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) again with an article on Rights of the Individual. Procedures coaches need to ensure all the rights of individuals include how you delete personal data or provide data electronically in a commonly used format.
The main rights for individuals under the GDPR will be:
• subject access,
• inaccuracies corrected,
• information erased,
• direct marketing,
• prevent automated decision-making and profiling, and
• data portability (updated one)
The General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) has references to both ‘consent’ and ‘explicit consent’. Do you know the difference? I looked at this aspect in my post on the 8th June 2017.
I am concerned about the lack of information for the micro business which most coaches fall into. Please be aware of your responsibilities, as I know the coaches who have been on my workshops will be fully aware of.
Make sure you have registered and if not, here is the link www.ico.org.uk/for-organisations/data-protection-reform/

The IIC&M are going through a comprehensive re-branding campaign that includes a positive change of name to. This welcome name change accurately reflects why they exist, how they deliver an inclusive accreditation service, and what the benefits are – for everyone.

David Monro-Jones, COO said ‘As an independent not-for-profit organisation, run by coaches and mentors, with over 15 year’s accreditation expertise, we are an authority on accrediting professionals in our industry. We don’t have our own training course to promote, and we are not driven by shareholders. Therefore, our sole focus is to make sure every single step of the accreditation process directly benefits our members, including the hiring public’.

David goes on to say ‘These changes are long over-due and are in direct response to demands for a website that represents our international members, an accreditation process that is more inclusive, vigorous and representative of high-impact practice and last but not least,we’re addressing the number one reason why more than 50% of businesses fail in the first year – we are launching a practical business programme called The Business of Coaching; a free monthly educational module which is linked to a member’s CPD, which means when practitioner’s up-grade their accreditation status, they’ll also have the opportunity to further develop relevant business skills to support their clients. This level of value added support is unprecedented, and will go a long way to plugging the much needed gap between skills and business acumen’.

The difference between certification and accreditation is often misunderstood:

ü Accreditation is verification related to demonstration of competence to carry out specific tasks.

So accreditation is higher than certification, for example, students receive degrees, a type of certification, but it’s the university that has their courses accredited – often the reason why a student will select one university over another that does not have an accredited programme.

Increasingly, the public are demanding to work with accredited professionals, it’s a key differentiator in choosing an expert, so make sure you stand out in the sea of sameness by becoming accredited now by visiting www.coach-accreditation.services

curly

June 12, 2017

Had a lovely interview with Tony Bridge on Bolton FM radio https://www.boltonfm.com/ this morning. We discussed my latest book #Achievement: Cancer Free For 20 Years and he was a true professional as was obvious in his research. We discussed the cancer journey, the daily dozen I use to keep healthy and the new cancer recovery programmes I am now offering. https://www.curlymartin.com

He fully understood that the book not only covers the conventional treatment but also covers alternative therapies and is inspiring and uplifting as was his interviewing technique.

curly

April 24, 2017

Rights of the Individual
Your procedures need to ensure all the rights of individuals include how you delete personal data or provide data electronically in a commonly used format.
The main rights for individuals under the GDPR will be:
• subject access,
• inaccuracies corrected,
• information erased,
• direct marketing,
• prevent automated decision-making and profiling, and
• data portability (updated one)
The rights individuals under the GDPR are mostly the same as those under the DPA. Does your current procedures cover how you would react if someone asks to have their personal data deleted, how do you locate and delete the data? Who makes the decisions about deletion?

The right to data portability is new. This is an enhanced form of subject access where you have to provide the data electronically and in a commonly used format. You probably have all of these covered and it is also good to check before GDPR is introduced

When setting your marketing goals remember to research your target market first. Think along the lines of, where they shop, what they read and how they interact with the world.
When putting your life coach or business coach marketing together think about what you can do for the reader (avoid what you cannot do), such as, save or make them money, save or make them more time, make them more efficient,etc. Extra coach marketing tip – do not put too much into it, keep your message simple and clear.
Remember to always include how they can get in touch with you, contact details, logo, groups you belong to and other important information.

Life Coach, Business Coach, or any other niche coach or person practising coaching. You will already be aware of the need to register with the information commissioner Office. All the documents you hold electronic or paper based containing personal data will need to have details on where it came from and with whom you share it.

Making sure that you have these details in place will help you to comply with the GDPR’s accountability principles. One of these principles requires organisations (this includes life and business coaches who hold information) to be able to show how they comply with data protection by having effective policies and procedures in place. If you share information and if you have inaccurate personal data which you have shared, it is your responsibility to make sure you and the person/company which you shared the information have correct records.

Imagine you are working as a business coach and have sold a GDPR programme of coaching (as I suggested in the first blog on this topic) you may need to think about how to organise an information audit, across the companies you work within, or even an audit within particular business areas.

Again, as I stated previously, this is a great business opportunity for coaching where you can design a GDPR programme specifically for the companies you sell your coaching into, by combining your knowledge of both, to produce a perfect business opportunity for your business coaching company.

curly

April 12, 2016

HMRC are planning to bring in the requirement for all small businesses and self-employed workers to submit quarterly digital tax updates. I have already written to my MP expressing my concerns about the extra burdens this will put on my business as my accounts are prepared by an independent bookkeeper. More news on the subject – the Administrative Burdens Advisory Board (ABAB), has refused to support the Government’s plans.

Here is the extract from my March/April newsletter.http://www.achievementspecialists.co.uk/freebie/newsletter

The local Federation of Small Businesses is concerned (as am I) about the Government’s plans to require all self-employed and small businesses to provide mandatory quarterly Digital Tax Reporting by 2020. They are asking members to write to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, outlining the impact that the change will have on you and your business. I think that all coaches need to take action now to prevent massive workloads in the future. The FSB are recommending that you include in your letter, the impact that mandatory (rather than voluntary) Quarterly Tax Reporting will mean to you and your business and ask within the letter that the Government will ensure any decision to proceed with Quarterly Tax Reporting is on a voluntary basis only.

Send a copy of your letter to the Financial Secretary to the Treasury, 1 Horse Guards Road, London, SW1A 2HQ and send a copy to your local MP.

Apparently, there is an Independent HMRC overseeing body, called the Administrative Burdens Advisory Board (ABAB), and it has refused to support the Government’s plans to force small businesses to submit quarterly digital tax reporting, according to the Federation of Small Businesses – which I recommend all coaches join: Apparently the ABAB are saying, “compulsory digital record keeping and quarterly online updates is not an approach we can endorse.”

The Federation of Small Businesses (FSB) said that the ABAB has used its annual report to underline Read More

curly

November 5, 2015

On 9th November 2015, the International Institute of Coaching and Mentoring (IIC&M) are launching the Global Mentoring week, in celebration of the leaders that bring ideas to life, and expand human potential.
During this week in November, the IIC&M will inspire mentors everywhere, through local national and international activities designed to educate, empower, collaborate and engage. We will be introducing a wider network to new possibilities and exciting opportunities.
This is the first of it’s kind, and one that we trust will grow from strength to strength in the coming years.
Are you a leader, a senior manager, then you too are a mentor. There are over 2500 categories we have identified where mentors play a part in sharing their expertise with their teams. We have mentors from Sporting, Education, Finance, Property and many more taking part in the week.
Are you already working with formal or informal mentor(s) or planning to do so? The IIC&M can help you with (accredited) mentor selection, mentor education and accreditation of your (informal) mentors. http://www.iicandm.org/

In the middle of last year I was contacted by the directors of a new venture for coaches and asked if I would like to be involved. The company are Goaly.com and they are setting up a company to make coaching strategies from the top coaches available via videos, to anyone around the world. They were filming in London in September and wanted me to contribute some of my successful coaching strategies. I put together some ideas and after careful consideration we selected the most appropriate for the medium and the planned content of the website. David Vox, director interviewed me the morning of the filming just to get a feel for Read More